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 Compel wrote:
This may be an argument for argument's sake and I'm not entirely sure where I'm going with this but...

Why shouldn't it be "OK" to be rude to a cop?

Inspired far as it's "okay" to be rude to a subway attendant, a taxi driver, a store clerk, a traffic warden.

By which I mean, of course it's not "OK" to be rude to them but... Well. I might be talking gibberish here.

And in turn, why should people comply with illegal requests from police who make them hoping the person is ignorant of his rights? "Because if you know your rights and don't comply with illegal requests, they will beat/frame/shoot you and make it seem like you deserved it" is not a good answer. (which they will, which is you comply, out of fear in the face of corrupt authority)

 Xenomancers wrote:

Spoiler:

 Easy E wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
As far as I can tell from my research...there is no proof of a CCP. There is also no proff that the car was stopped for an out tail light. Ive heard police audio prior to the event and the police did not specify a reason for the stop.

Here's some facts about the case that liberal media does not tell you because it detracts from their agenda.

The cop shooter is Latino - as in he is also a minority.- Not relevant in a discussion of Police vs. Public
The cops were already on the lookout for a black man with dreadlocks that had committed an armed robbery the day before. Relevance? It has been reported, but no one has confirmed or denied the veracity of the radio audio that I am aware of. I would love a link to a local new source if you have it.
Witnesses are able to account for several verbal warning not to reach for his gun. There is also video of the police trying to resuscitate the victim as well. Reported on in this very thread. He received 1 warning, and was immediately shot 4 or 5 times.

In any case - I think this cop made a mistake and it's unlikely the victim was going to attempt harm on the police. However - it is a judgement call made in milliseconds that police make daily - I will always give an officer the benefit of the doubt in cases like this if a gun is found on the victim. In both these recent cases there was a gun involved - so it's pretty clear where I stand on this. This is the heart of the problem. Our training and police culture in about escalating and maintaining control not de-escalation

Lesson to the wise. Do everything you can in your power to put a cop at ease during a stop. Be polite - comply with all legal requests - and don't do anything other than look into their face/reach for anything/ or even move - unless they tell you. That is a terrible lesson and is Authoritarianism at is worst

My comments in Orange above.

The Latino comment is solely to rule out racial motivations. At least the white vs black rubbish that Obama is trying to sell the people right now.

Cops are authority figures - it is in your best interests to do what they say. Do you dispute this? That is the only meaning of my statement.

I don't disagree with you on the training. The way we train officers to "eliminate the threat" rather than do their best to preserve lives during rough situations is clearly wrong to me. However, with that being their current training I find it difficult to judge someone who reacts like this when someone is non compliant. I have had a gun in my face before - it is frightening beyond comparison. I don't pretend to imagine that the police are immune to this fear. When your training is to eliminate threats and you see a gun being reached for...what exactly do you expect to happen?

Do you really believe a cop gave a single warning and then shot a man with a kid in the back seat? Really? Do you think he accidentally pulled the trigger? or do you think he just really wanted to shoot somebody? Here is the most likely case - the officer told him in a calm voice not to reach for his wallet and then the last time he yelled it and then shot him. The fact that he shot him 4 times is actually irrelevant. That is what he is trained to do.

Please stay tunned I will attempt to locate the link to the audio.

I don't think anyone wanted to kill anyone in this instance. I think Castile wanted to comply with the officers, he pulled over, turned off the car and wanted to deal with the traffic stop in a reasonable manner. Minnesota has a duty to inform and carry permit holders are required to show police their permit. I think Castile was reaching for his wallet to comply with his duty to inform and that he likely also sensed the tension the police felt and wanted to show his permit to help defuse the situation and show that he wasn' a threat. I think the officer, when he learned that Castile had a carry permit and was armed didn't think carry permit holder = law abiding citizen, unlikely threat, I think the officer thought, ARMED citizen = deadly threat, regardless of whether or not he was lawfullly carrying with a state issued permit. Knowing that Castile was armed made the officer nervous and jumpy and when Castile reached for his wallet the officer told him to stop, Castile, being human, didn't stop instananeously and the officer was jumpy enough that he felt the need to shoot first before a law abiding citizen sitting in a car with his family on a routine traffic stop suddenly drew on him and tried to kill him and his partner, which was a totally unreasonable fear.

As a carry permit holder I know my state law requires that I believe there is a reasonable imminent threat of harm posed to me or someone else before I can lawfully use lethal force. Meeting another carry permit holder on the street and having him reach for something during the course of our conversation with each other doesn't consitute a reasonable threat of imminent harm. If I shot somebody who I knew was an armed carry permit holder just becuase he reached for something I would be charged with murder. I want society to hold our police officers to at least as high of a standard as we hold our armed citizens. That's not unreasonable to me.

Since you were there and all, can you provide us with evidence of your statement?

 Spinner wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
Witnesses are able to account for several verbal warning not to reach for his gun.

I thought the witness account was clarified as "one warning, then multiple shots" instead of "multiple warnings, then one shot"?

Do everything you can in your power to put a cop at ease during a stop.

Or you'll get shot?

Be polite - comply with all legal requests

Or you'll get shot?

Don't do anything other than look into their face/reach for anything/ or even move - unless they tell you.

Or you'll get shot?

Does none of that seem like a problem to you? I don't want to have to treat the police like a stray dog with a suspicious bit of foam around its mouth. Plus, it sounds like Mr. Casile was, in fact, politely complying with legal requests.

For what it's worth, I don't think there was malice aforethought; everything I've seen points toward someone who was far, far too nervous to safely handle his weapon around members of the public. That doesn't give Mr. Castile back his life.

Here is the quote I am referring to, and your implication, as I understood your point, is you shouldn't have to comply because they aren't supposed to shoot you anyway. The fact of the matter is, as few people have real perspective in this situation, other than strong opinions, that when you are complying and being polite, you are far less likely to put a police officer on edge. I would say that is a good thing. This is in no way an argument against different police training, I think we can all agree there is an issue there, and I am honestly on the fence, but one thing I know is if that was me doing that in a foreign country, then I would probably be awaiting trial in pre-trial confienent, unless I could prove hostile intent, so the standard should be much higher here in America.

But just because they should't shoot you isn't a reason not to be compliant and polite. Ever been rude to a server, well you probably ate spit. Be rude to a cop, you probably get "tack on charges" neither is right, but maybe you should do some inward fierce moral inventory as to why you think you should be able to treat people that way.

edited for spelling and a horrible keyboard.

 agnosto wrote:

Spoiler:

]

SemperMortis wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:
There are over a million LEOs in the US and we know from officer involved shootings data kept by the DoJ that the large majority of LEOs don't get involved in shootings. Therefore the decisions involved in situations that require officers to fire their weapon are not made on a daily or even common basis for any officers. Very very few officers die in the line of duty because it's not that dangerous of a job.

This particular instance was a traffic stop. Not a response to a crime in progress or the pursuit of a fugitive. A traffic stop, a simple interaction with the public. The public isn't dangerous all of us civilians live, work and interact with the public every day. There is no reason for cops to approach routine interaction with the public like a traffic stop with the fear that the public is an imminent threat. There's no data to support such a combative stance.

Just thought I would point this out. You seem to think that death is the only "danger" a cop faces. Lets not forget the 50,000-60,000 Assaults the police suffer on average every year, or the 15,000-16,000 Assaults that result in injury cops face every year. But hey, that is not a very dangerous job at all.

The US Employs around 800,000 SWORN officials (Police with the power to arrest/detain) according to those numbers you have about a 1/13 to a 1/16 chance to be assaulted in the line of duty and a 1/50 chance to be assaulted and sustain an injury. I would say that is a rather dangerous job.

And only about 1/2 of the military are ever deployed into a warzone so let's just call that a safe job too while we're at it.

From an earlier post in this thread (sorry for quoting myself):

Police made an estimated 11,205,833 arrests during 2014—498,666 for violent crimes, and 1,553,980 for property crimes.

Applying that 2014 number to the 2015 death by police officer number of 990 (I'm too lazy to dig up the 2014 database), there was a .00835% chance per arrest of a police officer killing a suspect. There is no data that encapsulates traffic stops or other interactions but adding these in would make that chance even less likely.

Let's put it another way. In 2014 there were 627,949 law officers in the US. There were 990 deaths caused by those officers which means that .158% of the police officers in the US killed someone.

And, here's a video that provides a bit of perspective (this is one view on the matter and like all data, it can be presented in a way that supports one side of an argument):

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Prestor Jon wrote:

Contrast that to 124 deaths in the line of duty for police, 50 by firearm, which was a large increase from 2013 when 102 officers died, 32 by firearm.

That's a 17.7% increase in the number of police deaths and a 36% increase in the number of those deaths involving a firearm. Statistically, that's alarming and cause for those in the field to be cautious (overly so?)

As far as I can tell it was an aberration. In 2015 it seems 67 LEOs died in the line of duty, 39 by gunfire.
https://www.odmp.org/search/year/2015

Prestor Jon wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

Spoiler:

 Easy E wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
As far as I can tell from my research...there is no proof of a CCP. There is also no proff that the car was stopped for an out tail light. Ive heard police audio prior to the event and the police did not specify a reason for the stop.

Here's some facts about the case that liberal media does not tell you because it detracts from their agenda.

The cop shooter is Latino - as in he is also a minority.- Not relevant in a discussion of Police vs. Public
The cops were already on the lookout for a black man with dreadlocks that had committed an armed robbery the day before. Relevance? It has been reported, but no one has confirmed or denied the veracity of the radio audio that I am aware of. I would love a link to a local new source if you have it.
Witnesses are able to account for several verbal warning not to reach for his gun. There is also video of the police trying to resuscitate the victim as well. Reported on in this very thread. He received 1 warning, and was immediately shot 4 or 5 times.

In any case - I think this cop made a mistake and it's unlikely the victim was going to attempt harm on the police. However - it is a judgement call made in milliseconds that police make daily - I will always give an officer the benefit of the doubt in cases like this if a gun is found on the victim. In both these recent cases there was a gun involved - so it's pretty clear where I stand on this. This is the heart of the problem. Our training and police culture in about escalating and maintaining control not de-escalation

Lesson to the wise. Do everything you can in your power to put a cop at ease during a stop. Be polite - comply with all legal requests - and don't do anything other than look into their face/reach for anything/ or even move - unless they tell you. That is a terrible lesson and is Authoritarianism at is worst

My comments in Orange above.

The Latino comment is solely to rule out racial motivations. At least the white vs black rubbish that Obama is trying to sell the people right now.

Cops are authority figures - it is in your best interests to do what they say. Do you dispute this? That is the only meaning of my statement.

I don't disagree with you on the training. The way we train officers to "eliminate the threat" rather than do their best to preserve lives during rough situations is clearly wrong to me. However, with that being their current training I find it difficult to judge someone who reacts like this when someone is non compliant. I have had a gun in my face before - it is frightening beyond comparison. I don't pretend to imagine that the police are immune to this fear. When your training is to eliminate threats and you see a gun being reached for...what exactly do you expect to happen?

Do you really believe a cop gave a single warning and then shot a man with a kid in the back seat? Really? Do you think he accidentally pulled the trigger? or do you think he just really wanted to shoot somebody? Here is the most likely case - the officer told him in a calm voice not to reach for his wallet and then the last time he yelled it and then shot him. The fact that he shot him 4 times is actually irrelevant. That is what he is trained to do.

Please stay tunned I will attempt to locate the link to the audio.

I don't think anyone wanted to kill anyone in this instance. I think Castile wanted to comply with the officers, he pulled over, turned off the car and wanted to deal with the traffic stop in a reasonable manner. Minnesota has a duty to inform and carry permit holders are required to show police their permit. I think Castile was reaching for his wallet to comply with his duty to inform and that he likely also sensed the tension the police felt and wanted to show his permit to help defuse the situation and show that he wasn' a threat. I think the officer, when he learned that Castile had a carry permit and was armed didn't think carry permit holder = law abiding citizen, unlikely threat, I think the officer thought, ARMED citizen = deadly threat, regardless of whether or not he was lawfullly carrying with a state issued permit. Knowing that Castile was armed made the officer nervous and jumpy and when Castile reached for his wallet the officer told him to stop, Castile, being human, didn't stop instananeously and the officer was jumpy enough that he felt the need to shoot first before a law abiding citizen sitting in a car with his family on a routine traffic stop suddenly drew on him and tried to kill him and his partner, which was a totally unreasonable fear.

As a carry permit holder I know my state law requires that I believe there is a reasonable imminent threat of harm posed to me or someone else before I can lawfully use lethal force. Meeting another carry permit holder on the street and having him reach for something during the course of our conversation with each other doesn't consitute a reasonable threat of imminent harm. If I shot somebody who I knew was an armed carry permit holder just becuase he reached for something I would be charged with murder. I want society to hold our police officers to at least as high of a standard as we hold our armed citizens. That's not unreasonable to me.

I totally agree with this. Shootings that would see most of us sent to prison for the rest of our lives are routinely waived away as "justified" when committed by police, without ever even being brough to a DA, much less an actual Jury.

This is what I have a huge problem with.

 agnosto wrote:
Since you were there and all, can you provide us with evidence of your statement?

Is this directed at me? I stated in my post that it was supposition, I prefaced my guess as to what whappened with "I think" multiple times because it's just my opinion based on the informatoin that's been made public. It's a possible narrative that fits the facts that we know, that's it.

I totally agree with this. Shootings that would see most of us sent to prison for the rest of our lives are routinely waived away as "justified" when committed by police, without ever even being brough to a DA, much less an actual Jury.

This is what I have a huge problem with.

Same here.

 redleger wrote:

Spoiler:

]

 Spinner wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
Witnesses are able to account for several verbal warning not to reach for his gun.

I thought the witness account was clarified as "one warning, then multiple shots" instead of "multiple warnings, then one shot"?

Do everything you can in your power to put a cop at ease during a stop.

Or you'll get shot?

Be polite - comply with all legal requests

Or you'll get shot?

Don't do anything other than look into their face/reach for anything/ or even move - unless they tell you.

Or you'll get shot?

Does none of that seem like a problem to you? I don't want to have to treat the police like a stray dog with a suspicious bit of foam around its mouth. Plus, it sounds like Mr. Casile was, in fact, politely complying with legal requests.

For what it's worth, I don't think there was malice aforethought; everything I've seen points toward someone who was far, far too nervous to safely handle his weapon around members of the public. That doesn't give Mr. Castile back his life.

Here is the quote I am referring to, and your implication, as I understood your point, is you shouldn't have to comply because they aren't supposed to shoot you anyway. The fact of the matter is, as few people have real perspective in this situation, other than strong opinions, that when you are complying and being polite, you are far less likely to put a police officer on edge. I would say that is a good thing. This is in no way an argument against different police training, I think we can all agree there is an issue there, and I am honestly on the fence, but one thing I know is if that was me doing that in a foreign country, then I would probably be awaiting trial in pre-trial confienent, unless I could prove hostile intent, so the standard should be much higher here in America.

But just because they should't shoot you isn't a reason not to be compliant and polite. Ever been rude to a server, well you probably ate spit. Be rude to a cop, you probably get "tack on charges" neither is right, but maybe you should do some inward fierce moral inventory as to why you think you should be able to treat people that way.

edited for spelling and a horrible keyboard.

I agree with you that people should always be civil and polite when interacting with police or other public servants or just people in general. Nothing is gained by losing yoru cool or being nasty to somebody especially somebody with the power to ruin your day and your life.

I also think it really needs to be a 2 way street and training needs to reflect reality. One of my friends at our club range told me that he was discussing this incident with a local cop he knows and my friend said he always tries to do the right thing if he's stopped, turn off the car, remove the key from the igntion, roll down the window, have his wallet out already, turn on the dome light if it's at night, etc. The cop's response was that doing all that would make him nervous and think that my friend would be trying to set him up for something. Which struck us both as being an unreasonable degree of paranoia.

As a comment from the peanut gallery, Prestor Jon's supposition has a ring of plausibility around it, notably it doesn't have an implication of 'bad faith' from any party involved but as a tragic, yet ultimately avoidable, situation that could ultimately only be resolved by a drastic step change in the US police forces culture.

Prestor Jon wrote:

 agnosto wrote:
Since you were there and all, can you provide us with evidence of your statement?

Is this directed at me? I stated in my post that it was supposition, I prefaced my guess as to what whappened with "I think" multiple times because it's just my opinion based on the informatoin that's been made public. It's a possible narrative that fits the facts that we know, that's it.

I understand but I think that you are projecting quite a bit in your statement and ignoring other facts that have come to light including the recorded radio traffic between the officer and dispatch.

While I agree that the officer may have reacted/overreacted poorly in the situation, he believed he was pulling over an armed robbery suspect which is quite a bit different from your assertion that he possesses some predisposition against all civilians being armed which is completely unknown at this point.

It's been a few days and I still have no idea whether or not the reason for the stop was a broken taillight or a armed robbery stop. This seems like the kind of thing we would have known pretty quickly.

Of course, any body cam footage, who knows? The cops seem to like releasing that quickly when it exonerates them, and sitting on it as long as possible when they're dirty. No conclusions can really be made from it's absence though.

 agnosto wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

 agnosto wrote:
Since you were there and all, can you provide us with evidence of your statement?

Is this directed at me? I stated in my post that it was supposition, I prefaced my guess as to what whappened with "I think" multiple times because it's just my opinion based on the informatoin that's been made public. It's a possible narrative that fits the facts that we know, that's it.

I understand but I think that you are projecting quite a bit in your statement and ignoring other facts that have come to light including the recorded radio traffic between the officer and dispatch.

While I agree that the officer may have reacted/overreacted poorly in the situation, he believed he was pulling over an armed robbery suspect which is quite a bit different from your assertion that he possesses some predisposition against all civilians being armed which is completely unknown at this point.

I understand. Yes, I agree that if the audio is confirmed as being true and the officers stopped Castile because they thought he was a robbery suspect that can explain an initial aggresssive stance by the officers. However, I would think when they saw his family in the car and exchanged words with him they would have relaxed a bit. Afterall, in that situation they were checking to see if he was the robbery suspect they weren't sure and since he was in fact not the robbery suspect there was the opportunity to discern the difference.

Even with that information that crux of the matter remains that the officers assumed a worst case scenario as the default posture and their anticipation of confronting a possible robbery suspect let them to overreact to an innocent man reaching for his wallet. I think it would have been prudent to be cautious and to try to quickly evaluate if Castile was the robbery suspect but it seems like the situation might have been one wherein the officer assumed Castile was a dangerous threat and therefore shot Castile at his first false move believing he had to defend himself from a dangerous criminal when in fact Castile wasn't a criminal at all and was trying to show his ID and permit to confirm that he wasn't a threat or a criminal. I think it's likely that the preconception of Castile being a threat made a natural and innocent action appear to be life threatening to the cop adn the whole situation never would have resulted in violence if it had been handled better.

I have found the local papers report on the audio here:

http://www.startribune.com/police-audio-officer-stopped-philando-castile-on-robbery-suspicion/386344001/

Some key quotes:

The officer decided the car looked suspicious. He radioed to a nearby squad that he was going to pull it over and check IDs of the driver and passenger.

“The two occupants just look like people that were involved in a robbery,” he said casually, according to police audio obtained by the Star Tribune. “The driver looks more like one of our suspects, just because of the wide-set nose. I couldn’t get a good look at the passenger.”

t’s unclear which robbery suspects police believed Castile and Reynolds resembled. However, one day earlier, the BCA issued a call for the public’s help in identifying two suspects in a July 2 armed robbery of a nearby Lauderdale convenience store. Both suspects in the July 2 robbery were described as black men with shoulder-length or longer dreadlocks. The descriptions of the suspects included the clothing each suspect wore, but did not include estimated height, weight or ages.

Albert Goins, an attorney who assisted the Castile family in the hours following the shooting, said that if Castile were indeed a robbery suspect, officers would have initiated a felony traffic stop, which “does not usually involve officers walking up to your car and asking you to produce your driver’s license.”

“A felony stop involves bringing the suspect out at gunpoint while officers are in a position of cover and having them lie on the ground until they can identify who that individual is,” he said.

You can find the pre-stop audio here: http://www.startribune.com/audio-officers-discuss-stopping-philando-castile-s-car/386337111/

@Prestor John

I understand your point and the scenario you present is certainly feasible; however, the facts are really lacking here. We simply can't attribute all blame to the officer when we don't know what happened or was said before the Mr. Castile's girlfriend began her recording. While it's entirely possible that the officer was completely at fault, it's also entirely possible that Mr. Castile or his girlfriend were at fault of escalating the situation.

Consider another scenario wherein the officer pulls them over and speaks with them calmly while the girlfriend is making snide comments to the officer or talking over him while he is attempting to communicate with Mr. Castile. Possibly other actions or words were exchanged before the shooting.

None of the above is cause for Mr. Castle to lose his life but neither would it make him a completely innocent victim of a killer cop. We don't know and may never know what all happened but we can try to keep an open mind instead of gathering up the torches and pitchforks.

One thing I do know is that the officer will have to live the rest of his life with the outcome here and so unfortunately will Mr. Castile's family.

 agnosto wrote:

Consider another scenario wherein the officer pulls them over and speaks with them calmly while the girlfriend is making snide comments to the officer or talking over him while he is attempting to communicate with Mr. Castile. Possibly other actions or words were exchanged before the shooting.

None of the above is cause for Mr. Castle to lose his life but neither would it make him a completely innocent victim of a killer cop.

Actually, it WOULD still make him a completely innocent victim of a killer cop as it isn't illegal for your passenger to make snide comments or not unquestionably licking boot. In your 'another scenario' he is still totally innocent and the cop is still a murderer.

 agnosto wrote:
@Prestor John

I understand your point and the scenario you present is certainly feasible; however, the facts are really lacking here. We simply can't attribute all blame to the officer when we don't know what happened or was said before the Mr. Castile's girlfriend began her recording. While it's entirely possible that the officer was completely at fault, it's also entirely possible that Mr. Castile or his girlfriend were at fault of escalating the situation.

Consider another scenario wherein the officer pulls them over and speaks with them calmly while the girlfriend is making snide comments to the officer or talking over him while he is attempting to communicate with Mr. Castile. Possibly other actions or words were exchanged before the shooting.

None of the above is cause for Mr. Castle to lose his life but neither would it make him a completely innocent victim of a killer cop. We don't know and may never know what all happened but we can try to keep an open mind instead of gathering up the torches and pitchforks.

One thing I do know is that the officer will have to live the rest of his life with the outcome here and so unfortunately will Mr. Castile's family.

How would they have escalated the situation? We know for a fact he was reaching for his wallet. They could have both been as rude as possible, telling the officer to go feth himself and it would not have been grounds for killing him. It absolutely would make him an innocent victim of a killer cop because he was still innocent. The only thing he could have done in this situation to be shot is pull his weapon on him and we know that did not happen.

You are not guilty of anything for being rude. It is your right to be rude. Not a nice thing to do, but still your right.

 redleger wrote:

 Spinner wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
Witnesses are able to account for several verbal warning not to reach for his gun.

I thought the witness account was clarified as "one warning, then multiple shots" instead of "multiple warnings, then one shot"?

Do everything you can in your power to put a cop at ease during a stop.

Or you'll get shot?

Be polite - comply with all legal requests

Or you'll get shot?

Don't do anything other than look into their face/reach for anything/ or even move - unless they tell you.

Or you'll get shot?

Does none of that seem like a problem to you? I don't want to have to treat the police like a stray dog with a suspicious bit of foam around its mouth. Plus, it sounds like Mr. Casile was, in fact, politely complying with legal requests.

For what it's worth, I don't think there was malice aforethought; everything I've seen points toward someone who was far, far too nervous to safely handle his weapon around members of the public. That doesn't give Mr. Castile back his life.

Here is the quote I am referring to, and your implication, as I understood your point, is you shouldn't have to comply because they aren't supposed to shoot you anyway. The fact of the matter is, as few people have real perspective in this situation, other than strong opinions, that when you are complying and being polite, you are far less likely to put a police officer on edge. I would say that is a good thing. This is in no way an argument against different police training, I think we can all agree there is an issue there, and I am honestly on the fence, but one thing I know is if that was me doing that in a foreign country, then I would probably be awaiting trial in pre-trial confienent, unless I could prove hostile intent, so the standard should be much higher here in America.

But just because they should't shoot you isn't a reason not to be compliant and polite. Ever been rude to a server, well you probably ate spit. Be rude to a cop, you probably get "tack on charges" neither is right, but maybe you should do some inward fierce moral inventory as to why you think you should be able to treat people that way.

edited for spelling and a horrible keyboard.

Looks like there might have been a bit of a miscommunication - I don't advocate being anything but polite to authority figures, service workers, or anyone else you happen to bump into in day to day life - furthermore, I lobby for sarcastic humor and petty revenge leveled at people who breach this rule (I worked retail for a bit).

Xenomancer's post appeared to justify, or at least excuse, the use of lethal force against rude or uncooperative people because an officer might be on edge. This is something I do not advocate.

So I read that cracked.com article someone linked. While I'm not a fan of cracked.com generally and that article left many unexplored avenues... So typical click with stuff. However it did mention the Peelian Principles za which I looked up via the font of all knowledge, Wikipedia.

So the interesting thing is, many of the sounds from it I had heard before but I had never read the whole thing. At the very least, is an interesting read I think, even if you don't agree with the practicalities of it.


______________

1) To prevent crime and disorder, as an alternative to their repression by military force and severity of legal punishment.

2) To recognise always that the power of the police to fulfil their functions and duties is dependent on public approval of their existence, actions and behaviour, and on their ability to secure and maintain public respect.

3) To recognise always that to secure and maintain the respect and approval of the public means also the securing of the willing co-operation of the public in the task of securing observance of laws.

4) To recognise always that the extent to which the co-operation of the public can be secured diminishes proportionately the necessity of the use of physical force and compulsion for achieving police objectives.

5) To seek and preserve public favour, not by pandering to public opinion, but by constantly demonstrating absolutely impartial service to law, in complete independence of policy, and without regard to the justice or injustice of the substance of individual laws, by ready offering of individual service and friendship to all members of the public without regard to their wealth or social standing, by ready exercise of courtesy and friendly good humour, and by ready offering of individual sacrifice in protecting and preserving life.

6) To use physical force only when the exercise of persuasion, advice and warning is found to be insufficient to obtain public co-operation to an extent necessary to secure observance of law or to restore order, and to use only the minimum degree of physical force which is necessary on any particular occasion for achieving a police objective.

7) To maintain at all times a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and that the public are the police, the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.

8) To recognise always the need for strict adherence to police-executive functions, and to refrain from even seeming to usurp the powers of the judiciary of avenging individuals or the State, and of authoritatively judging guilt and punishing the guilty.

9) To recognise always that the test of police efficiency is the absence of crime and disorder, and not the visible evidence of police action in dealing with them.

__________

Of course I'm not saying the UK always follows them (Hillsborough being a major example that has been in the news again recently) but for principles they're pretty darned good.

nkelsch wrote:

 agnosto wrote:

Consider another scenario wherein the officer pulls them over and speaks with them calmly while the girlfriend is making snide comments to the officer or talking over him while he is attempting to communicate with Mr. Castile. Possibly other actions or words were exchanged before the shooting.

None of the above is cause for Mr. Castle to lose his life but neither would it make him a completely innocent victim of a killer cop.

Actually, it WOULD still make him a completely innocent victim of a killer cop as it isn't illegal for your passenger to make snide comments or not unquestionably licking boot. In your 'another scenario' he is still totally innocent and the cop is still a murderer.

So, torches and pitchforks it is then.

 agnosto wrote:

nkelsch wrote:

 agnosto wrote:

Consider another scenario wherein the officer pulls them over and speaks with them calmly while the girlfriend is making snide comments to the officer or talking over him while he is attempting to communicate with Mr. Castile. Possibly other actions or words were exchanged before the shooting.

None of the above is cause for Mr. Castle to lose his life but neither would it make him a completely innocent victim of a killer cop.

Actually, it WOULD still make him a completely innocent victim of a killer cop as it isn't illegal for your passenger to make snide comments or not unquestionably licking boot. In your 'another scenario' he is still totally innocent and the cop is still a murderer.

So, torches and pitchforks it is then.

Sure, if you ignore everything we already know. You seem to have your mind made up already.

 Dreadwinter wrote:

 agnosto wrote:
@Prestor John

I understand your point and the scenario you present is certainly feasible; however, the facts are really lacking here. We simply can't attribute all blame to the officer when we don't know what happened or was said before the Mr. Castile's girlfriend began her recording. While it's entirely possible that the officer was completely at fault, it's also entirely possible that Mr. Castile or his girlfriend were at fault of escalating the situation.

Consider another scenario wherein the officer pulls them over and speaks with them calmly while the girlfriend is making snide comments to the officer or talking over him while he is attempting to communicate with Mr. Castile. Possibly other actions or words were exchanged before the shooting.

None of the above is cause for Mr. Castle to lose his life but neither would it make him a completely innocent victim of a killer cop. We don't know and may never know what all happened but we can try to keep an open mind instead of gathering up the torches and pitchforks.

One thing I do know is that the officer will have to live the rest of his life with the outcome here and so unfortunately will Mr. Castile's family.

How would they have escalated the situation? We know for a fact he was reaching for his wallet. They could have both been as rude as possible, telling the officer to go feth himself and it would not have been grounds for killing him. It absolutely would make him an innocent victim of a killer cop because he was still innocent. The only thing he could have done in this situation to be shot is pull his weapon on him and we know that did not happen.

You are not guilty of anything for being rude. It is your right to be rude. Not a nice thing to do, but still your right.

Ever watched an episode of Cops? We know that Mr. Castile's girlfriend stated that he was reaching for his wallet. What "fact" are you talking about? Do you have pictures before the video that was streamed? Some sort of prescience?

Seriously, the only fact here is that some young man's life was unfortunately cut short at the hands of a police officer. We can jump to all sorts of conclusions of just admit that we weren't there and don't know, for a fact, what happened in its entirety.

I'm not saying the officer is innocent but neither do I know all of the facts surrounding what transpired and to do otherwise would be silly in my mind.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Dreadwinter wrote:

 agnosto wrote:

nkelsch wrote:

 agnosto wrote:

Consider another scenario wherein the officer pulls them over and speaks with them calmly while the girlfriend is making snide comments to the officer or talking over him while he is attempting to communicate with Mr. Castile. Possibly other actions or words were exchanged before the shooting.

None of the above is cause for Mr. Castle to lose his life but neither would it make him a completely innocent victim of a killer cop.

Actually, it WOULD still make him a completely innocent victim of a killer cop as it isn't illegal for your passenger to make snide comments or not unquestionably licking boot. In your 'another scenario' he is still totally innocent and the cop is still a murderer.

So, torches and pitchforks it is then.

Sure, if you ignore everything we already know. You seem to have your mind made up already.

What do we know? A partial recording of the event, a radio transcript, several statements. The whole affair is unfortunate but stating we know all of the facts behind the event is a bit premature at this point in time but then, you've already made up your mind.

We know that he was a licensed for CC. That is a fact. He had every right to have his gun on him. We know for a fact that is not illegal. We also know that he was not reaching for his weapon, he was reaching for his wallet. No amount of character assassination is going to change that.

I get your whole "the media is biased and lies" spiel going on here, But if you are waiting for a perfect recording of the whole event from all points of view, that is never going to happen. This is a man with no criminal history and absolutely no reason to draw on two LEOs with his family in his car. It makes zero sense to suggest otherwise.

 Dreadwinter wrote:
We know that he was a licensed for CC. That is a fact. He had every right to have his gun on him. We know for a fact that is not illegal. We also know that he was not reaching for his weapon, he was reaching for his wallet. No amount of character assassination is going to change that.

I get your whole "the media is biased and lies" spiel going on here, But if you are waiting for a perfect recording of the whole event from all points of view, that is never going to happen. This is a man with no criminal history and absolutely no reason to draw on two LEOs with his family in his car. It makes zero sense to suggest otherwise.

I never said he was attempting to draw on the officer. I have never stated anything negative about Mr. Castile other than posit that there might, possibly be more to this than random cop wakes up one morning and decides to start shooting people. Going by some posts in this this thread, the officer might as well have committed premeditated murder. I'm proposing another viewpoint than what seems to be the most popular one in this thread, that's what discussion is about; if we all agreed, there'd be nothing to talk about.

My assumption. Cop's not a bad guy, he may have made a bad call in the split-second he had to make that call; would any of us have done differently? Maybe, maybe not. I wasn't in the man's shoes, thankfully, so I don't know what I would have done. Mr. Castile wasn't a bad guy. He had no way of knowing the cop had ID'd him as resembling a perp from an armed robbery that occurred the previous day. Cop was doing his job, civilian was minding his own business, the rest played out how it did and there was a terrible result. Siting in my comfy chair, can I say that the cop coulda-shoulda handled it differently? Yes, I can say that but I can also realize what a BS, kneejerk reaction that is and count my lucky stars that I don't have to make those kinds of decisions at all. I can second and third guess people's decisions in hindsight til the cows come home but the simple fact is that I'm not them, I'm not the poor working guy that didn't get to finish enjoying his birthday, I'm not the cop that gets to live the rest of his life with the guilt associated with taking another person's life. I hope you'll forgive me if I portray the officer in human terms other than some maniacal, evil man.

Nobody is saying he is a "maniacal, evil man." What everybody is saying is that when you murder somebody, there should be consequences. Even if you are an LEO. It doesn't matter if the cops not a bad guy. He did a bad thing. He should be held accountable.

What proof is there btw that Castile was reaching for his wallet and not a gun? Isn't it basically his word against the girlfriends word? not exactly proof positive

SemperMortis wrote:
What proof is there btw that Castile was reaching for his wallet and not a gun? Isn't it basically his word against the girlfriends word? not exactly proof positive

He was reaching for his CCP.

 Dreadwinter wrote:

SemperMortis wrote:
What proof is there btw that Castile was reaching for his wallet and not a gun? Isn't it basically his word against the girlfriends word? not exactly proof positive

He was reaching for his CCP.

How do you know?

Has the dash cam been released?

 Dreadwinter wrote:

SemperMortis wrote:
What proof is there btw that Castile was reaching for his wallet and not a gun? Isn't it basically his word against the girlfriends word? not exactly proof positive

He was reaching for his CCP.

Dread I mean, what proof was there in regards to that? Who said he was doing that? to my knowledge (limited because I don't usually follow clickbait/race bait) the only proof is his girlfriend saying he was doing that....which again would become his word vs her word.

SemperMortis wrote:

 Dreadwinter wrote:

SemperMortis wrote:
What proof is there btw that Castile was reaching for his wallet and not a gun? Isn't it basically his word against the girlfriends word? not exactly proof positive

He was reaching for his CCP.

Dread I mean, what proof was there in regards to that? Who said he was doing that? to my knowledge (limited because I don't usually follow clickbait/race bait) the only proof is his girlfriend saying he was doing that....which again would become his word vs her word.

The video after the fact where she is explaining what just happened immediately after the shooting. Since it had just happened, she was able to accurately remember and then get it on audio. There is the fact that he had absolutely zero reason to pull a weapon on two cops. There is the eyewitness that said he was given a warning then immediately shot.

I mean, there is plenty of evidence to back this up. You will never get video evidence of this, even if there is a dashcam. The dashcam was not in the car right on top of him to video record it. The evidence we have now is probably the best we will get in that regard.